Title: The Rose Field
Author: Pullman, Philip
Published by: David Fickling Books in association with Penguin Books
Year: 2025
Date reviewed: 04.26
ISBN: 978-0-241-45869-3
The third part of "The Book of Dust" trilogy. See here for parts 1 & 2.
Warwickshire Libraries copy.

Well, it finally arrived – the third and final volume of the ‘Book of Dust’ trilogy. Parts 1 and 2 are reviewed here. I was critical of the third book of the ‘Dark Materials’ trilogy (review here): would Pullman pull it off this time, I wondered? Well …

Story-telling is an important part of Lyra’s character and a pervasive theme in both series, so I assume it’s important to Pullman himself too. And like ‘Dark Materials’, this is a good story. There’s plenty of intrigue, action, fantastic creatures old and new (notably gryphons), a return of the witches, scheming, friendship and betrayal played out by some familiar and some new characters.

But I feel that if ‘The Rose Field’ and its two precursors were ever to be studied as part of an English Literature syllabus there would be many faults found. Some episodes covered in detail disappear like water in the sand and are never followed up; new characters enter the narrative, are described in detail and then dropped; some seemingly important concepts (‘good numbers’ and the disembodied voices who first mention them, for example) are referred to and discussed but never appear again. Of course it’s a story, a fantasy, and not everything has to be explained or resolved; after all, that is part of the world in which it is set. Mysteries are allowed! But I can’t help thinking that Pullman has indulged himself by bringing in some ideas that he finds intriguing, like quantum mechanics, number theory, or the strange ‘wandering lake’ of Lop Nor (a real thing), purely because he wants to write about them. Consequently the story sometimes loses focus, leaving the reader thinking “What was that all about?”, or “Why did we have all that stuff earlier?”

But despite all that, and repeating my views on ‘Dark Materials’, I think most readers will be carried along by the pace and excitement and not worry too much about these problems. It is after all a cracking good tale!